Lessons
by Jonesy E
Summary: An old father has many lessons to teach. Series inspired by Father's Day.
1. Blue

This started as an exercise in free-thought, brought on by Father's Day. It's very short, but I truly love the character of Splinter. Sort of a cop-out title. Happy Father's Day to all you daddies out there.

* * *

Of the four, it takes him the longest to learn to read. For every minute of he has held the upper hand during sparring, every second of the most seamless katas, he spends hours glaring at their scavenged library book, lying open on the table. It's a book of history, or so he's told. He hates this book.  
His brothers have already graduated to scribbling shaky letters, leaving the teaching table hours before him. He stubbornly remains, his lips trembling with the effort, willing his tiny seven-year-old brain to comprehend.

"Now," he tells the paper, "I will understand you. Now." As if all at once, a secret will be revealed to him. Like magic.

But no magic happens. The white page does not answer. The words sit as dull and heavy as before. He hears the happy giggling and horseplay of his brothers in the room beyond, and begins to cry.

His father appears while he is wiping his nose rather pitifully on the tails of his blue bandana. He immediately feels foolish and drops his hands, one fat tear rolling down his snout.

"My son," Splinter says. "What is the matter?"

"Nothing, Sensei." But his eyes drift to the open book with its ugly white page and stupid black words, and fresh tears well in his eyes.

"Leonardo." Splinter kneels next to him, saying nothing for a few extended moments. His Sensei's eyes take in the book and his son's dirty, tear-stained face. He feels shame weigh heavy on his tiny shoulders.

"Shall we read together, my son?" his Sensei asks after a time.

"Sensei?" He does not understand. He and his brothers are always taught together, never apart; the same material, in the same place, at the same time. It is their way.

"Come, Leonardo." Splinter takes the book in his gnarled claws, placing it on his lap. "We shall have a lesson, you and I. Let us start here."

They work for extra hour that day, his struggles embarrassing him beneath the patient eyes of his master. Splinter does not chide, or harangue; only corrects when he errs, and supports when he is weak. They spend an hour alone after each group lesson to follow and slowly, he begins to improve. The words begin to change, not seeming so foreign, so ugly. The feel of the book's crumbling cover becomes comforting, familiar, as familiar as the rustle of his father's robes, or the warmth of his eyes. He begins to be excited, looking forward to what will happen next in their big book of history. Until one day, Splinter takes the book and places it in his lap.

"Will you read to me, my son?" his Sensei asks.

He reads out loud until the candle burns low. When they finally finish with the book, Splinter retires it to their as-yet empty bookshelf, watching his eldest with quiet eyes.

"You will have to find more for us to read," his master says, his voice filled with something his child brain cannot name.

The book is still his favorite to this day.


	2. Red

I got another idea, and decided to add on to the first little tidbit with another stand-alone piece. Again, featuring Splinter and one of his sons in the spirit of Father's Day. I would be nice if two more pieces just popped out of my skull, but I'm not promising anything.

* * *

Raphael is headstrong and rebellious as a teenager, but is downright ornery as a child. He picks fights with his eldest brother over who will sit next to their Father at the dinner table; he refuses to share his apple slices and stomps on Donatello's foot when he reaches for a piece. He pushes Michelangelo into a foot-deep, rancid green puddle after the youngest turtle beats him in a race down the sewer pipe. Their master is always warning that his foul deeds will come back to haunt him, and that those that are unkind are often punished in the end.

Which is, surely, why he finds himself facing certain death in his bed tonight.

He doesn't know how it happened. He is sleeping as he normally does-on his stomach, one hand under the pillow and one hand under plastered under his chubby cheek-when an ominous shiver runs from the tip of his tail to his head. Suddenly anxious, he opens his bleary eyes. And there it sits

The biggest, most hairy black spider he has ever seen. Sitting on his pillow.

Inches from his face.

At first, he is paralyzed with fear, his short little limbs tensing in anguish. The creature is so close he imagines he can see his reflection in its six beady eyes, and see the slaver on its jaws. It doesn't move, but he doesn't dare make a sound. If he does, it will hear him, and attack.

He keeps his eyes on the thing as he frantically reviews his options. He can go back to sleep, and then it will eat him. He can call for help, and then it will eat him. Or he can shoot out of bed with every ounce of ninja skill in his six-year-old body, and run screaming for the door. It seems like his best choice.

Then, as if the spider senses its new friend is planning escape, it unfurls its hairy little body and slowly crawls. Right over his exposed arm.

He begins to shriek. In the rooms beyond, he can hear his brothers stirring at the sudden noise, but it is his father that is there the quickest, barely a split second after he's opened his mouth.

Splinter is haggard and ruffled from a night of sleep. His dark eyes assess the situation quickly. He scoops the hairy black intruder up in his dexterous paws and leaves the room. When he returns, the creature is gone, and he calms Raphael with soothing circles on his shell until the child ceases screaming.

"It is alright, my son. It is gone."

Once he is done gulping air and screaming, Raphael asks, "Did'ya kill it, Sensei?"

Splinter pauses. "No."

Raphael feels his limbs tense again reflexively. "Why not?" he howls, agitated. "Stupid bug!"

"Think, my son. It was an intruder, true. But a harmless one. It did not deserve death for wandering so careless into our home. I have placed it outside, far from us. Hopefully, it will not return."

Raphael thought of the spider's hairy legs, and razor sharp pincers, and shuddered. "You shoulda killed it."

Splinter fixes his second youngest son with an even gaze, firm but warm.

"I could have. It could not have defended itself. But slaughter without cause holds no honor, my son. It is not the way of the ninja. Remember this."

The next time Raphael has a close encounter of the eight-legged kind, he is eleven. It crawls out from under their rickety table as they are all eating breakfast together. Raphael considers the spider, and remembers the words of his Sensei so long ago. He feels Splinter's eyes on him.

He squishes the devil with Donatello's milk cup.

Leo grimaces. Donatello complains that his glass now has spider guts all over it. Michelangelo makes a gagging sound. Splinter puts his head in his paw.

Some lessons do not stick as well as others.

* * *

Fin.


	3. Purple

A/N: This started out as the third installment to 'Lessons' and quickly became something much larger than I'd planned. I still think it fits, so I kept it here. Donny was the hardest so far, but something clicked suddenly, and this came out. Reviews are awesome-in addition to being helpful, they keep me motivated.

_Momotaro_ is a Japanese folktale with many incarnations and versions, sort of like _Cinderella_. I shortened it a LOT to get it to fit, but the basic idea remains the same. Hope you enjoy!

* * *

He remembers the first time he knows that he is different from everyone else.

He is young, one of _very_ few outings when his father finds the energy to wrangle them all together above ground. They are practicing stealth, the subtle art of moving unseen, in a little-trafficked alley late at night. When the occasional late-night wanderer walks by the alley's mouth, they immediately shrink into the shadows, blending into their surroundings with all the surreptitiousness that a five-year-old bipedal turtle can manage. After two hours of this, Splinter gathers them together and prepares to return home.

Michelangelo, ever the beauty enthusiast, chooses that moment to wander out of the alley shadows while Master Splinter has his back turned. He toddles over to a pretty woman standing at the street corner alone, waiting for a cab and quite obviously drunk. Her summer dress looks silky and soft, the pattern white with large orange flowers, Mikey's favorite color. He reaches out to touch it.

The woman looks down at him, and screams.

After Splinter has snatched Michelangelo and the flower-dress woman has run shrieking down the street, their Sensei watches them severely as they climb single-file down the ladder toward home. Michelangelo does not understand.

"But why'd she scream, Sensei?" he asks. His voice is small. "I wasn't gonna hurt her. I was only gonna tell her how pretty it was."

Donatello watches the harshness leave Splinter's eyes, replaced by something softer and infinitely more sad. For a moment, he is even lost for words.

"I am sorry, my son," he says finally. "But this is a discussion for another day. You will...understand in time."

Michelangelo is still confused...but Donatello understands very well. They are different from other people. Even at five, his brain tells him that those differences are massive. Possibly irreconcilable.

This is the first time he realizes they are alone.

A short few years later, he is made aware of a different type of isolation. They are sitting around the television, waiting impatiently (Raph most of all) for Splinter's news program to be finished so they can watch reruns of the Thundercats. There is a reporter on the screen, jabbering about a breakthrough in the genome sequencing of primates that Professor So-and-So presented at some university or another. Donatello listens closely, enraptured.

"Ugh, this is BORING," mutters Raphael next to him, just loud enough for Splinter to send him a stern look. "Who cares if this stupid guy pokes around in old genes or whatever? Who cares about a 'diulted hallux'?"

"'Divergent hallux,"' answers Donatello. "Not 'diluted', 'divergent'. Hallux being the most medial digit on the foot, and divergent referring to it being out of line with the other four digits. An opposable thumb, basically. Most primates today have divergent hallux on both their hands at feet. Except humans, that is-they need their toes in line for efficient bipedal movement. And us, but I don't think we're technically primates."

His three brothers look at him as if he has just sprouted wings and flown circles over their heads singing the national anthem in Italian. Even their Sensei is staring, his normally benign expression one of quiet surprise instead. Donatello deflates under their eyes, shrinking into himself. Raphael is the first to recover, popping his gaping jaw shut and sticking out his lower lip. "Smart ass," he says, and Splinter cuffs him for language.

This is the first time he realizes that _he_ is alone.

Forever after, Donatello sees that he is vastly different from his brothers, both within the bounds of their ninjutsu training and without. He trains, but he does not have Leonardo's skill, nor his innate ability for leadership; he fights, but he does not have Raphael's strength, or almost suicidal sense of loyalty. He converses, but he lacks Michelangelo's carefree dialogue and easy grin.

He can take disassemble and toaster and build a small sentient robot from its parts; solve graduate level calculus problems; fix a leaking water heater with an old sock and some chewing gum, and solder an electric circuit. But he cannot mend this gap between his family and himself.

He loves his brothers, and they love him, but they do not understand him. The thought brings a sense of loneliness so acute, it pierces his soul like steel.

And this loneliness is where he finds himself, awake on a cold winter's night long after anyone legally sane has retired to bed. A six cylinder engine sits half-gutted on the coffee table before him, but its sweet call has long since turned sour in his ears. He is thirteen, looking for answers in its rusted pistons, seeking knowledge in the nooks full of curdled motor oil and soot.

"Donatello?"

He hears the voice behind him and jumps. But it is only their Father, floating into the living room on silent feet. Sensei holds a candle in his paws.

"It is late, young one."

Splinter takes in the sooty, oily mess of gears and engine parts that his coffee table has become with what Donatello reads as a slight weariness. Guilty, his hands grope for a random lug nut or engine clamp in an automatic attempt to look as if they are doing something.

"I know, Sensei."-

"You cannot sleep." Splinter peers at him closer. "What troubles you?"

Donatello considers briefly attempting to put his plight into words for his Father, the man that has scrimped and begged and struggled to keep them alive for all his life. This man, who collected them from amid shards of shattered glass and raised them to be his own sons. And from whom Donatello feels completely and utterly estranged.

He does not know where to start.

Instead he fumbles clumsily with the engine piece, his teen angst feeling sharper and more bitter than ever. He hates this, hates feeling lonely, confused, and out of place. He hates feeling inferior to his brothers, who are so different individually but have more in common with each other than he could ever dream of having.

They sit in silence for a moment, the flickering of the candle in the drafty room the only whisper of sound.

Then Splinter rises from his seat beside him. "Do you recall the tale of _Momotaro_, my son?"

Donatello starts at the odd question. "Yes, Sensei," he replies.

"A fine tale, it is. I too am finding it suddenly hard to sleep. Perhaps you will recite the story for an old rat while he makes a cup of tea?"

Donatello does not understand the relevance of this request, to recall this children's folktale in the middle of the night. It does nothing to improve his mood.

But all he says is "Yes, Sensei." And begins to recite the tale.

_Many years ago, an old woodcutter and his wife found a peach floating in a stream near their house. Taking the delicious morsel home to eat it, they are surprised to break it open and find a babe inside. They raise the lad as their own, calling him _Momotaro_. When their young son had grown, he set out to vanquish a gang of terrible ogres nearby, taking with him a box of hearty millet dumplings that his parents had made him. Along the way, he met a monkey, a peacock, and a dog, whom he enlisted into his service in exchange for a dumpling each. When Momotaro finally approached the stronghold, he faced a great wall that no human could climb. But his friend, the monkey, scaled the wall with easy and unlocked the door. The peacock, with its sharp beak, pecked the eyes from the waiting ogres and sent them into chaos. The dog, with its sharp jaws and ferocious strength, helped Momotaro drive the remainder of the ogres into the sea, where they perished. _

"Such a fine tale," Splinter repeats when the story is over. Donatello can hear him shifting things in the kitchen, preparing his tea. If anything, he feels confused, and more than a little perturbed. He wants nothing more than for Splinter to leave with his tea and leave him to his oily engine parts. He feels like Raph.

"I told this tale to you many times when you were younger, my son." Splinter waddles back toward him, carrying a steaming cup of tea gingerly in his fingers. "Do you remember?"

"Yes, Sensei."

"Momotaro is the hero, a great and grand warrior born of a simple peach. But the monkey, the peacock, and the dog are also worth noting, don't you think?"

"Master?"

"Momotaro's friends, his brothers in combat, are able to act when he is not. They overcome the challenges that the hero would have been hard pressed to best on his own. The nimble scaling of a gate; the pecking of an eye; the tenacity of a bite. Each action had its place, and led in the end to victory."

Splinter lays a gentle hand on Donatello's shoulder, and he looks up.

"Every warrior has his strengths, my son-each different, and each is necessary. To be strong where others lack is a rare and valuable skill."

His Sensei sets the tea on a coaster near his hand. "I grow tired. Please do your best to scrub the oil stains from the carpet when you are finished. Good night."

It takes Donatello ten minutes to notice that his Sensei takes no tea for himself.

* * *

That was long. Way long. But it felt good. R&R?


End file.
